Universal York

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1820s Archives

Some months ago I wrote about the Pennsylvania German Birth and Baptismal certificates (often known as Taufscheine or Fraktur) that were produced in the Hanover print shop of Wilhelm Daniel Lepper and Samuel Endredy Stettinius.  These two printers established Hanover’s first newspaper Die Pennsylvanische Wochenschrift, in 1797 and issued their

Do you ever wish you knew what your ancestors were like?  After all, they were living, breathing souls just like you and me.  Most of you probably know or knew your parents and all or many of your grandparents.  Some even remember a great-grandparent or so.  Just multiply those family

Some of you might be lucky enough to have Pennsylvania German birth and baptismal certificates that were done for family members well over 100 years ago.  Or you just might be intrigued by the art and design of these unique folk art documents and perhaps collect them.  I have written

Each of our York County communities, no matter what size, seems to have its own uniquely rich history.  My own families settled, some well over two hundred years ago, in the southeastern part of the county.  I still have so much to learn, especially about the rest of the county.

While doing some research on Phineas Davis and his York locomotive for an upcoming column, I realized I had never posted my column from some time ago on John Elgar and his Codorus steamboat. Elgar was a member of York’s Quaker community, as was Davis, and his iron steam boat

A few weeks ago I posted the tale of Spoonie Gohn’s supposed encounters with Slaymaker’s ghost at Margaretta Furnace. I had initially shared that story with the attendees at the York Daily Record annual Unraveling York County History night in early December. Margaretta Furnace with the grand mansion house and